Hopkins Hospital Workers Ratify New Contract

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Friday, July 11, 2014
WBAL Radio

Workers staged one mini-strike and were threatening to walk off the job again before an agreement was finally reached.

It was a long, drawn-out labor dispute with a lot of back-and-forth wrangling. Now, food, maintenance and other service workers at Johns Hopkins Hospital vote 93 percent to ratify a new contract. Below is a news release from 1199 SEIU (Service Employees International Union).

BALTIMORE - Caregivers at Johns Hopkins Hospital voted by a 13-to-1 margin to approve a new contract that will substantially lift wage rates. The four-and-a-half year agreement will dramatically improve pay for long term and low-wage workers at Hopkins.

Employees at Hopkins will receive raises as high as 38 percent over the life of the contract. The Hopkins workers — members of Eleven Ninety-Nine S.E.I.U. — also won a $15-an-hour minimum wage that will apply immediately to workers with 20 years of service. Workers with 15 years of service will make at least $14.50 in 2015.

“This contract will make a real difference in the lives of Hopkins workers, and sets a stronger standard for healthcare workers all across Baltimore,” said Michelle Horton, a food service worker who’s been at Hopkins for nine years. Horton will receive a 24.5 percent raise over the life of the contract. Her pay will increase nearly $3 an hour from $11.35 an hour to $14.13 an hour.

Highlights of the agreement include:

Total raises as high as 38 percent for long-time, low-paid Hopkins workers, a boost of as much as $4.30 an hour over the life of the contract.

A $14.50 minimum wage in 2015 for workers with 15 years’ experience, whose pay will rise to over $15 an hour in 2017. Current workers will make at least $13/hour by 2018.

Across-the-board raises of at least 2% every year, with a 2% raise and a 0.5% bonus in the first year of the contract, and a 2.75% raise in 2017.

An agreement to establish a committee to review market rates for surgical techs, pharmacy techs and other workers whose pay is under market.

In a July 8 editorial, the Baltimore Sun said the contract “represents a victory not only for the hospital and members of 1199SEIU United Healthcare Workers East but for Baltimore.”

Workers voted 93 percent in favor of the agreement in the two-day ratification vote, which was held on Thursday from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. and Friday from 6 a.m. till roughly 5:30 p.m.

The vote followed an intense contract campaign in which Hopkins caregivers held a three-day strike in April, a mass rally in the Inner Harbor in May, and scheduled a four-day strike in late June.

The second strike was called off after Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley intervened on the eve of the walkout and asked both parties to agree to a one-week cooling-off period. The parties held two more bargaining sessions after O’Malley’s request, and reached agreement on the contract at roughly 2 a.m. on Tuesday, July 8.